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Monday 9am - 4pm Wednesday 9am - 4pm

Refined in Action, 10 F. J. McAulay Ct., Charlottetown, PE (2026)

04/10/2024

With spring in the air, I wanted to expand on a post I did at new years, talking about new habits, learning, and growth. It's the blog, found on my website: https://www.refinedinaction.com/post/tend-to-your-growth

03/25/2024

This is the third of the “Nine Essentials” created by Anat Baniel. The Nine Essentials are the governing principles of the work, and I encourage my clients (and myself!) to find ways to apply them in my day to day life.

The Essentials aren't things that we can do constantly, or are meant to do constantly. But they are powerful ways to open the door to positive changes in how you move and feel.

The What: Variation is finding ways to do things differently rather than repeating the same action over and over again.

The Why: Repetition is one of the main tools used in learning today. If a child is struggling with addition, we give them more addition problems to solve. Or, if someone trying to learn how to serve a volleyball, they practice the same movement over and over again. There is nothing wrong with repetition, but on its own, it is not always effectual for learning. Anat often says, “We learn our experience.” Not from our experience, we learn our actual experience. If you’re struggling with something, and you try to get better by doing that same thing over and over, it’s easy to make a habit out of the failure, rather than improving. Introducing variation to the task can help you better feel what it is that you are already doing.

The How: I’m going to use the volleyball serve as an example, but you could apply this to any movement. Start by doing what you usually do to serve. Then, try to find many different ways to achieve the goal (striking the ball with your forearm). You’re not looking to do a good serve with these variations, you’re looking to change how it feels to do the serve itself. Try a really wide stance, a really narrow stance, or stand on your toes. Strike the ball close to your wrist, and close to your elbow. Lift your shoulders high in the air, or crouch down. Do a terrible serve intentionally. After a few variations, just serve the ball without thinking about it, and notice if it’s changed.

Let me know in the comments if you try this, and what your experience is!

03/06/2024

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02/14/2024

Our second essential! I’m continuing to give a brief overview of each of the Nine Essentials of ABM. The Nine Essentials are the governing principles of the work, and I encourage my clients (and myself!) to find ways to apply them in my day to day life.

The Essentials aren't things that we can do constantly, or are meant to do constantly. But they are powerful ways to open the door to positive changes in how you move and feel.

The What: Slow is self-evident!

The Why: Anat always says, “When you go fast, you can only do what you know.” Remember our first essential, movement with attention? Do you think you could move with attention while going quickly? You wouldn’t really feel what you were doing. Slowing down allows us the time and space to really notice what it feels like to do a movement.

The How: Choose a movement from a hobby of yours: a golf swing, a simple dance step, miming a paint brush stroke, or just taking a step. Don’t choose a movement that involves jumping. Do your movement at normal speed 2 or 3 times, and notice what it feels like to do.

Now, do the movement at half speed, and notice what that feels like. Notice in particular all the different parts of the body that are involved in the movement. Are you holding any parts of your body stiffly as you do the movement? If so, can you let go of some of that tension?

Now, do the movement at a quarter of the original speed, seeing if you can notice even more parts of yourself as you do the movement, all the way to your fingers and toes.

If possible, do the movement at 10% of the original speed. Only do this if you can do it with ease; don’t go so slowly that it becomes difficult to balance. Notice again what you feel as you slow way down.

Then, go back to doing the movement at the original speed. Does it feel any different than when you first did it?

Let me know your experience of moving slowly in the comments!

02/03/2024

New headshot for the new year, so I thought I'd say hello again! I'm Lexi. I grew up steeped in theatre and the performing arts, and unfortunately sustained a lot of minor, but lasting, injuries. I felt that my body was always on the edge of getting injured, or lacked the strength to keep up with my peers. I tried different modalities to heal and get stronger, but nothing made a lasting impact. When I tried ABM, I wasn't expecting much, to be honest. I was curious more than anything. But the impact of the first lesson I had was enormous. After my first lesson I felt as though I had no tension in my body, and that night I had the best sleep of my life. I was blown away! I later decided to take the training, not only for the personal benefits, but with the hope of sharing some of those benefits with others. Since I made ABM a regular part of my routine, I've felt stronger and more resilient. I have few injuries, and if I do get injured, I heal faster. I find my quality of sleep is better, I have much less tension in my body...the list goes on! I'm passionate about sharing this work with others. It's groundbreaking, while also being gentle and simple. If you have any questions about the work, and if it might benefit you, send me a message!

01/10/2024

Our first essential! As promised, I’m going to be giving a brief overview of each of the Nine Essentials of ABM. The Nine Essentials are the governing principles of the work.

The What: Movement with attention is exactly what it sounds like—paying attention to the way that you are moving. This isn’t something that we can do constantly, or are meant to do constantly. But it is the way to open the door to potential positive changes in how you move.

The Why: How often have you found yourself in conversation with someone, and suddenly noticed that you’re holding your shoulders up and tense, and that you’ve seemingly been doing it for awhile? We don’t always move in ways that are the easiest and most comfortable for a variety of reasons, and one of them is because we have of habits and patterns of movement. Tuning in to how we are moving in a given moment is the first step in being able to change how we are moving, and to discover more comfortable and easier ways to move.

The How: Choose a small, simple movement that you do everyday, such as opening the fridge, putting on your shoes, or doing a shoulder check before backing out of a parking spot. Before you start the movement, notice how you are holding your body. Are you tensing any muscles, such as your shoulders, or your jaw, that you can let go of? Do you feel comfortable right now, or do you feel pain or tension? Next, do the movement, paying attention not only to the part of your body that is moving, but to other parts of yourself as well. If you are moving your arm, do you feel any movement in the shoulder, ribcage, or back? Do you shift your weight as you move? Are you breathing freely and easily, or are you holding your breath?

Find a few opportunities to do this during the run of the day. Ask yourself: do you notice any changes in the way you did those movements? Do you notice any other changes? If you noticed tension or excessive effort, were you able to find a way to do the movement more easily simply by paying attention to what you were doing?

Let me know your experiences of moving with attention in the comments!

12/29/2023

Have you found yourself approaching the new year with dread, worried that you’ll start something only to give up on it after a month?

New year’s resolutions are all well and good, but if you want to build a new habit, you have to come from a strong foundation. You won’t succeed getting up earlier if you can’t address or find out how to change why you’re exhausted.

This year, can you give yourself permission to look at yourself from the ground up? To not look at yourself as a machine, plugging in inputs and cutting off or numbing places of pain, but as an integrated whole of mind, body, heart, and soul? And from there, ask yourself: what needs to be tended to?

When I first started doing ABM, I thought it was a “body thing”. And while movement is the language, it is only an intelligible language because it is a part of the whole functioning of the human person. In my life, ABM has changed not only my body, but how I think, and this in turn has been radiating out into my emotional life. It’s helped me become more integrated; to look at myself not as a machine that needs fixing, but as a garden that needs cultivating.

ABM is now an indispensable part of my life, in large part because it is a concrete thing that I can do to help me have a healthy relationship with myself. And if you haven’t experienced ABM, that might sound like too much to expect, or a strange thing to expect from a modality based in movement. But because the method is built on safety, on meeting you where you are, and helping you feel what it is that you are already doing, I think it is one of the best tools to help you change for the better how you relate to yourself.

So if there’s something you’ve been living with, even if it’s been for a long time, like pain from an old injury, or chronic fatigue or lack or energy, why not try ABM this year? And if you’re not sure it’s for you, or how it works, because here I’ve given more of a personal reflection than a scientific overview, send me a message—I’m always happy to provide more information and answer any questions.

My prayers for you for a peaceful new year.

12/24/2023

Merry Christmas! And may God bless you in the new year!

11/15/2023

In a previous post, I shared more about how ABM uses movement to engage the brain. The goal is to enable our clients (or “students) to perceive differences, because nothing can change until there is a perception of a difference. Movement alone will not necessarily help the brain perceive differences, and that’s where the nine essentials come in.

The analogy isn’t perfect, but if you think of the way that I literally move a person during a lesson as a vocabulary, the nine essentials are the way I speak: my tone, pitch, volume, and so on.

Over the next few weeks, I will break down each of the essentials, going into more detail about why they are important and how they work.

In my last post, I referenced the expression "No pain, no gain", and also talked about how some of the principles of ABM can seem almost too simple or easy to work. Are there any of the essentials that stand out to you as being "too simple"? How do you think these principles relate to hands on work?

Learn more or book now at: refinedinaction.com ; link in the bio.

11/08/2023

When I first started learning about ABM, there were aspects of the work that seemed “too easy”, or, so simple that it shouldn’t work. I think this says more about the way we tend to think than it does about ABM. It’s one thing to value hard work, practice, and dedication, and it’s another to think that outcomes come from a type of struggle. Is “no pain, no gain” true? Is it true all, some, or none of the time? I’ll come back to this topic in the future, but for now, let me know what you think in the comments!

11/03/2023

I've shared a lot about the benefits, but ABM is a little known modality that is substantially different from rehabilitation and therapy modalities.

The Anat Baniel Method, or “ABM", was founded by an Israeli woman named Anat Baniel. ABM is a learning modality that uses movement to engage the brain.

So what does that mean--“learning by using movement to engage the brain”? Well, as Anat is fond of saying, “Movement is the language of the brain.” She coined the term “NeuroMovement” to emphasize the idea of the brain and the body being one system.

ABM uses slow, gentle movements to help a client (or “student”, as we call them) increase their awareness of themselves and how they are moving. During a session (or a “lesson”), chronic muscular contractions can let go, most often resulting in greater ease of movement, freedom from pain and tension, and also a feeling of calm and relaxation.

How does that work, and how does ABM differ from various movement therapies such as occupational therapy, physiotherapy, and massage? ABM is based on the science of neuroplasticity, the field of neuroscience that studies the ability of the brain to learn, change, and form new connections. We learn and change the fastest and most easily in particular conditions—such as when we feel safe, calm, and unhurried. Anat came up with a set of principles which she calls the "Nine Essentials" that create these ideal learning conditions. These “essentials” are applied in concrete ways in all ABM lessons.

In essence, ABM applies principles of neuroplasticity to movement in real time. The result is that the brain and body are better able to communicate and work as they truly are: one complete system, as opposed to two mechanisms at odds with each other. How often do we think about our brain as the “driver” and our body as the “car”? ABM challenge this idea, often with incredible results. I recently shared a bit of my story overcoming pain and injury through this work.

For more information about ABM, check out my website (link in the bio), or visit Anat's website at anatbanielmethod.com

10/27/2023

My colleague, Kenny Lingley, is offering NeuroMovement group classes! These classes are an excellent way to experience ABM. The series of lessons he is doing is specifically for neck and shoulders, and I highly recommend it!

Refined in Action

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